Home » Articles posted by ipcopymark (Page 20)
Author Archives: ipcopymark
Grace Periods: Patent Harmonisation report from UKIPO
The UKIPO website has published an interesting US and UK study on the subject of grace periods.
The report notes that around 30 countries in the world have a grace period (defined in the report as “A period of time, before a patent application for an invention is filed, in which the invention could be disclosed without its novelty being lost”) but that EPC states have no meaningful grace period to speak of.
A handy table summarising available grace periods around the world can be found in Annex 3 of the following report which is referenced in the UKIPO publication. (more…)
Who ya gonna call? (in case of Brexit)
Now that we’ve had the General Election in the UK and the Conservatives have returned to power on their own, it looks like we’ll be getting a referendum asking whether we should stay in the EU or leave (the “hokey-cokey” referendum).
Against this political backdrop IPcopy has become aware of half-heard rumours suggesting that the possibility of the UK exiting the EU could be used in the run-up to the referendum to suggest that UK based European Patent Attorneys are not a safe bet for patent applicants outside Europe. As the story goes, because the UK could be booted out of the EU, this would have some kind of knock on effect on the ability of UK-EPAs to represent effectively at the EPO.
IPcopy would like to point out to anyone that may have heard something similar that this is clearly a load of tosh. (more…)
UPC – Court fees and recoverable costs – some more detail
The UPC Court fees consultation was launched on 8 May 2015 and runs until midnight on 31 July 2015. Comments are requested, preferably in English, to secretariat@unified-patent-court.org.
The consultation provides for a mixture of fixed and value based fees. There are also two proposals for amendment of Rule 370 (Court fees) of the Rules of Procedure along with a table of fees and a scale of ceilings for recoverable costs. (more…)
UPC Court Fees Consultation launches 8 May 2015
The UPC Preparatory Committee met this week on 5 May (Turbo Tuesday) and the big piece of news from the meeting is that the consultation document in respect of for the court fees and recoverable costs for the Unified Patent Court is ready to launch. The written consultation will run from tomorrow 8 May 2015 for 12 weeks. This means that from tomorrow we should hopefully have some idea what the fee amounts in Rule 370 of the Rules of Procedure (see page 149-150) will look like. (more…)
Spain v the Unitary Patent – CJEU gives Unanimous Points Decision to the Unitary Patent System
Unless you’ve missed it somehow, INTA is on and the average patent attorney is probably feeling a little left out as emails and photos of the latest INTA party do the rounds. Well fear not patent attorney brethren because the unitary patent system has a lot going on today.
Yes, on a day that literally no-one (but me) is calling Turbo Tuesday, we can look forward to the CJEU’s judgments in C-146/13 and C-147/13 (Spain v the Unitary Patent: the rematch) and a packed Preparatory Committee meeting in which we expect the details surrounding the European Patent Litigators Certificate to be finalised and the consultation on the court fees for the Unified Patent Court to be given the go ahead.
The Spanish result is first up and while the judgments weren’t available at the time of writing available, a press release has been, well, released which dismisses both of Spain’s actions. [Update: the judgments are now available – C-146/13 and C-147/13] (more…)
General Election 2015: What do the parties say about IP? (IP – Hit or miss?)
Still on the fence about the general election? Well, fear not as IPcopy is here to give you a run down on the most important policy area of them all. Yes, it’s time to look at what the parties have got to say about Intellectual Property.
Rather than subject ourselves to having to read the manifestos of the various parties (we’re not masochists you know), IPcopy has located PDF copies of the manifestos for the Conservatives, Labour, the Liberal Democrats, UKIP, Plaid Cymru, the Green Party and the SNP and has performed a word search for any of the following terms: patent, trade mark (or trademark), design (IP related design references only), copyright, intellectual property.
So, here we go…. (more…)
UPC updates: Judgment Day for Spain & confusing communications from the EU Commission
A couple of unitary patent snippets today comprising news of Judgment Day in the CJEU for Spain and a confusing European Commission communication. (more…)
IPcopy 